London -LRB- CNN -RRB- -- India has launched a rocket it hopes will allow it to join an elite group of space explorers to Mars .

The country 's space research organization -LRB- ISRO -RRB- launched its orbiter to the Red Planet on Tuesday -- only NASA , the former Soviet Union and the Europeans have previously been successful in operating probes from Mars .

Japan made an attempt with the Nozomi orbiter in 1998 but it failed to reach the planet and a Chinese probe was lost along with the Russian Phobos-Grunt mission in January 2012 . The UK 's Beagle 2 probe separated from the European Space Agency 's Mars Express orbiter in 2003 but nothing was ever heard from the lander .

It will take 10 months for India 's Mars Orbiter Mission to reach the Red Planet after lifting off from the Satish Dhawan Space Centre near Chennai . The probe will explore the planet 's surface features , minerals and atmosphere .

ISRO is hoping to discover more about the loss of water from Mars , map the sources of methane gas , as well as collecting data about the two moons Phobos and Deimos .

But ISRO chairman K Radhakrishnan told CNN that one of the biggest technological challenges was just getting there . Many missions have failed to reach the planet while others have crashed on the surface or contact has been lost before the probes could send back data .

India 's space program launched its first Earth satellite in 1975 and put an unmanned probe into orbit around the Moon in 2008 . It plans to launch its own manned spaceflight in 2016 , though an Indian cosmonaut , Rakesh Sharma , flew aboard a Soviet space mission in 1984 .

The U.S. is aiming to build on the success of a series of robots that have roamed the surface of the Red Planet when it launches its own orbiter mission called Maven -- Mars Atmosphere and Volatile Evolution spacecraft -- scheduled to launch on November 18 .

The European Space Agency is working with the Russians on an ExoMars rover that is due to start its mission in 2018 .

But private companies are also proposing trips to the Red Planet -- and some of them are only one-way .

The Mars One project wants to colonize Earth 's neighbor , beginning in 2022 and the Inspire Mars Foundation wants to launch a man and a woman on a 501-day round-trip in 2018 without ever touching down .

Is India 's Mars mission fueling Asian space race ?

Explore Mars discoveries with CNN 's interactive map

More on future Mars missions

CNN Mars full coverage

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Only NASA , the former Soviet Union and Europeans have succeeded with Mars probes

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India 's spacecraft will explore the planet 's surface features , minerals and atmosphere

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ISRO chairman K Radhakrishnan says one of the biggest technological challenges is just getting there

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NASA is due to launch its MAVEN probe to Mars later in November